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Familiar uncertainty: Bruins preparing for lockout

BOLTON – As Tuukka Rask fielded questions prior to the Bruins’ annual golf tournament Monday, a reporter asked when he thought the season might start.

“My guess is as good as yours,” Rask answered. “I really don't know. Some people say December, some people say November, some people say January. Who the heck knows?”

“Does anybody say ‘On time?’” asked the reporter as the goaltender and media began to laugh.

"I don't think so," Rask said with a grin. "Time's running out here I guess."

That, in a nutshell, is where the NHL stands just days away from it’s latest lockout. With the current collective bargaining agreement set to expire on Saturday and both sides still far off in negotiations, the chance that camps and the season begin as planned is becoming more and more miniscule.

The Bruins have already cancelled their rookie camp, which was set to open Friday, and their training camp’s Sept. 21 start doesn’t look too promising either. The clock is ticking for the NHLPA and league to agree, but as both sides head to New York this week to hold meetings, the players hardly seem optimistic.

"I don't know if optimistic's the right word, not with the way things have been going so far," Andrew Ference said while sporting an NHLPA hat. "It's pretty tough to be optimistic. I think at the beginning of the summer there were a lot of great talks. Hopefully that can continue and we can see some progress. Obviously this next week or two is pretty big."

If the sides do not agree by Saturday, it will mark the third consecutive lockout as a result of failed CBA negotiations. The owners locked the players out in October of 1994, and the league had its infamous cancelled season back in 2004-05 before the sides agreed on the current CBA.

“I just can't see that happening again,” Claude Julien said of missing a whole season. “We've made such good strides as far as our sport is concerned. It would be a shame to take a step back."

Krejci said Monday that he will play in the Czech Republic if the season doesn’t start on time, but he came to Boston Sunday with the intention of getting camp started next week. Others, like Seguin and Rask, don’t know what they’ll do.

“It's just the unknown. You don't know what's going to happen: You're going to play in the NHL, you're going to go to Europe or you're not going to play anywhere,” Rask said. “It's just keeping yourself in shape and working hard and keeping your mind fresh and staying patient.”

Rask has obviously had to stay patient for quite some time. After waiting his turn to become the Bruins’ starter for a full season, the job is Rask’s with Tim Thomas taking the year off, but now Rask will probably wait even longer with the likelihood of a late start to the season.

The 25-year-old goaltender said he will almost definitely not play in Finland this season, but he will play somewhere if the NHL doesn’t get started on time. Given that he hasn’t played in an NHL game since suffering an abdomen/groin strain on March 3 against the Islanders, Rask doesn’t want to miss more time than he’s already had to.

“Absolutely, I want to play somewhere because I haven't played in a while,” he said. “If you don't play and you jump right in the NHL, you can have an eight-month layover and be a little rusty, so I definitely want to play somewhere.”

Of course, as Bruins players rally with the rest of the NHLPA for a deal that they feel is fair, it’s their owner who’s sitting at the other end of the proverbial table. Jeremy Jacobs is one of five executives (fellow owners Craig Leipold, Murray Edwards, Ted Leonsis and Toronto general manager Brian Burke are the others) on the league’s negotiating committee. While the players and owners want different things, Ference doesn’t see anything uncomfortable about being on Jacobs' payroll while negotiating against him.

"Well he's our owner," Ference said. "The relationship is, he's our owner. It's not like we're [having dinner] and there's awkward dinnertime conversations. It's his business, and business people make their decisions. We're part of a union and union people make their decisions.

"It's not like they can't see where we're coming from and we can't see where they're coming from," he added. "Both sides can obviously see the reasons why they want what they want. That's not difficult. The difficult part is when it starts to interfere with the sport and the progress the sport's making. That's where you get the frustration. Hockey's doing really well, and to see it stop, we definitely don't want to see that. It's a shame if it comes to that."

Everyone seems to agree what a shame another lockout would be, but it seems they’re prepared for it.

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